DPRK's top leader vows to crush U.S. hostile policy

PYONGYANG, April 2 (Xinhua) -- Kim Jong Un, top leader of the Democratic People' s Republic of Korea (DPRK) has vowed to crush the U.S. hostile policy toward Pyongyang amid tensions on the Korean Peninsula, the official news agency KCNA reported on Wednesday.

Kim made the comments on Tuesday in a speech to officers at Mount Paektu, the highest peak on the peninsula. He described the current situation as "grave" and said his military will "thoroughly crush the hostile U.S. policy," said the KCNA report.

Kim was present at the oath-taking meeting of the Korean People' s Army commanding officers, who vowed to safeguard their top leader by "blowing up all strongholds of the U.S. aggressors and other hostile forces once an order is issued."

Kim's speech came days after Pyongyang threatened to carry out a "new form" of nuclear test in response to a United Nations condemnation of its recent ballistic missile launches.

The two Koreas traded hundreds of rounds of live artillery fire across their disputed western maritime border on Monday during Pyongyang' s pre-announced live-fire artillery drills, which further heightened tensions on the divided peninsula.

On Tuesday, the DPRK' s main Rodong Sinmun newspaper called South Korean President Park Geun-hye "an eccentric old maid, and an idiot" over her comments in Germany on the DPRK' s economic difficulties and its homeless children, in its latest scathing verbal attacks on Park.

SEOUL, April 2 (Xinhua) -- The Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) was believed to fly a drone for the surveillance purpose to one of the five South Korean islands just south of the inter-Korean western sea border where Pyongyang conducted its live- fire drill earlier this week, Seoul's presidential official said Wednesday. Full story